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Zeta Taskforce
Jun 27, 2002

Is there something that you accomplished that you are proud of? Have you just paid off your first credit card, your last credit card? Did you just become debt free? Did you have a side project that is really taking off, or land the first real job after school? Are you following a monthly budget and for the first time ever you are in control of your money (and your life) and not reacting to one crisis after another?

Please tell us! Share what you did and what you had to do to get there. None of this is easy and maybe you have a thing or two to teach us. Or maybe when we see what you accomplished with your hard work and sacrifice, you will inspire others. If you are in a rut and need inspiration, then this thread is for you too. Ask others how they did it, how they won.

This isn't about who has the most, but instead about sharing, learning and winning.

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ObsidianBeast
Jan 17, 2008

SKA SUCKS
Earlier this year my wife and I paid off both of our cars about 2 years early, which freed up a ton of cash per month that we've been dumping into an emergency fund. It felt great to have paid-off cars, and made me not want to ever have a car payment again. About a month ago, my wife was hit by a guy who ran off but was eventually caught, but going through the cops and his insurance has been quite a process. We've actually used the time to try out being a 1-car family, which I always thought was a nice idea but not really possible for us. It's actually gone so well that I think we'll continue being a 1-car family even after the accident is dealt with.

Since paying off our cars, we've built up our emergency fund to about 4 months worth of expenses, and it feels so freeing to have that cushion in case anything ever happened to our jobs. I think the best thing we did to our budget was to cut to the bare minimums while paying off credit card debt a few years ago, then only having our lifestyle increase enough to not make us stressed out about each budget line. We're at a point where we spend a little more than is necessary on things like food, but still keep it far under where we used to be before we had a budget at all. Because of this, we actually stick to the budget and don't hate doing it, but still make progress towards our financial goals.

CornHolio
May 20, 2001

Toilet Rascal
I recently got an entirely-positive review and a raise with it though I won't know how much until payday (Friday).

That's good because I bought a car I'm not familiar with and it has some things that need fixing, so the extra money will help in the short term to sort those out.

SweetTooth Mephisto
May 1, 2008
I just got the biggest raise I've ever gotten at this job and I've gone from 3rd shift to day shift. All I had to do was work hard for five years and make myself valuable enough survive multiple rounds of layoffs. Yay!

archangelwar
Oct 28, 2004

Teaching Moments
I just got a kicking rad job in Manhattan and I have been dying to get out of my suburban hell. It will be work on a highly visible product in a highly visible company, so it will be a great experience. Also I am in love with NYC so I want to buy the t-shirts and wear them every day.

canyoneer
Sep 13, 2005


I only have canyoneyes for you
Two years ago I had just transferred to a university from a community college, I was working a crappy retail job to pay for school, and had trouble finding money at the end of the month while my wife and I lived in a 600 sq ft one bedroom apartment. I was in an upper division course taking a midterm, and realized that I was not prepared enough for the test. After leaving the test, I sat down and calculated the net present value (ROI) of the decision to quit work and take out student loans to live on.
My assumptions included: less time at work would lead to more time I could spend on schoolwork, I would get better grades and be more attractive to employers, I would be able to commit to internships next summer in my field (paid maybe?), and that the better prospects would yield, say $5k more on my first job offer than I would have received otherwise.
I used the average interest rate of subsidized/unsubsidized federal student loans as my cost of capital (opportunity cost), assuming I'd take those out of if savings dried up and I came up short during the semester.
The number came back at $85k, so I quit my job that day and never looked back. I sold my old, gas guzzling SUV and bought a cheap motorcycle for cash. I cooked (almost) all my meals and became really good at it. I spent more time with my best friend: my sweet wife.

I happened to receive a $3,500 grant from my university three days later. I didn't apply for it, but they gave it to me on a repeating basis for the rest of my time there. I got great grades, stood out among my classmates, and landed a well-paid, very competitive internship with a fantastic company which led to a full-time offer upon graduation. I got so much more out of school not struggling to play catchup and the 'grades game', and got to have the time to master the material. We even saved enough money to pay cash for a weeklong vacation to South America upon graduation. The signing bonus at work was more than double my unsubsidized loan balance (now paid off), and I still have 4 months before I have to start paying on the modest subsidized loan balance (at 3.5% :woop: ). Our car is going to be paid off in November, and I have enough cash for another modest, reliable car.

This worked for me because I busted my hump working toward a degree in high demand that I was confident I'd be able to find work in. It still took a great leap of faith. I acknowledge that a great deal of luck played into this, but luck favors the prepared.

SpclKen
Mar 13, 2006
New Goon... go easy

Got married in October of 2010 while living in So. California. Was trying to rebuild my carrier after being layed off in 09 from a 7 year job for which I had moved from Ca to Nebraska to Rhode island. The new job payed 50% of what I was previously making. Since being married:

Took a new job in TX and wife was able to transfer her job
Bought a house
Got my wife pregnant with Twins
Got a large pay raise

Now I am back on track and almost back up to my pre-layoff salary. In two months I will pay off my mortgage. In 3 months the twins will be born and we will become a one income family. It has been a crazy two years and will be an even crazier two years coming up.

Annakie
Apr 20, 2005

"It's pretty bad, isn't it? I know it's pretty bad. Ever since I can remember..."
Thanks to BFC I bought and just finished reading All Your Worth. Five months ago I got a new job with a nearly 25% increase in pay and I've been very haphazard with how I've been spending that pay increase (although quite a bit did go into home improvements and occasionally tossing chunks into savings.) At my last job I made enough to be doing okay but never really had a solid safety net aside from a 401(k) which my employer didn't contribute to and maybe $500 - $1000 for a safety net.

Two days ago I created two new savings accounts on ING for "Savings" and "Wants-Savings" and next month when my new job's 401(k) kicks in I'll be at 19.1% savings, (including matching) 54% Must-Haves and 26% for Wants, which I'm totally comfortable with.

I'm hoping to build a new house in 2-3 years and finally have a plan to start making that a reality that I've been putting off for too long. I've owned my current home for 9 years so I have equity built up in it, but my new home will cost about double what my current house is worth to build so I need to get serious about preparing for that. I finally feel like I'm able to do so.

My only regret is that I didn't have All Your Worth to read 15 years ago when I was just starting out so I could have avoided a whole lot of terrible mistakes I made. I've been recommending it to all my friends since I started reading it.

Annakie fucked around with this message at 23:10 on Jul 12, 2012

Ashcans
Jan 2, 2006

Let's do the space-time warp again!

Earlier this year my wife and I paid off our last credit card debt. For the last couple of months we have been diligently tracking all our spending in Mint and trying to hammer out a budget so that we can save up some more cash and start really taking care of things like retirement.

The downside is that this has made it clear that the problem isn't really that we spend money frivolously, it's that I just don't make enough to cover everything. :smith: I guess the upside is that we've identified the problem and can work out how to solve it (sell organs). :unsmith:

Sephiroth_IRA
Mar 31, 2010
I've stated this in other BFC topics but it makes me feel good to repeat it. In the past two years my wife and I have:

Paid off all of our Credit Card debt, which included our wedding expenses.
Paid off both of our cars.
Saved over $10,000 in cash.
Maxed two Roths for 2011. We've yet to contribute for 2012.

So at the moment our only debt is the mortgage, which is under water. Fortunately we live in a non-recourse state so if worse comes to worse we can always walk away. Our goal now is simply to save as much money as possible for a potential down-payment or complete purchase of a small home.

By the end of this year I'm expecting to have about $30,000 in cash saved up.

Edit: Should I read "All Your Worth"? I've read "The Millionaire Next Door" and other books which preach frugality/budgeting and at the moment I can't find a way to make my life cheaper without sacrificing my happiness. Is there anything in that book for someone like me? I've heard about other books which preach about spending and enjoying your money while your young but I get the impression those books assume that the reader accepts that they will be working until they can claim social security which isn't my goal.

Sephiroth_IRA fucked around with this message at 14:19 on Jul 16, 2012

Annakie
Apr 20, 2005

"It's pretty bad, isn't it? I know it's pretty bad. Ever since I can remember..."
I don't think "All Your Worth" is for you. You're already way ahead of where most people reading AYW would start. Even I'm in the middle of the pack and a lot of it was "I wish I knew this a long time ago, but I'm already past this part." It's more for the people starting out, or for people with huge debt and no savings. I'm more in the situation of no debt aside from mortgage/car but also no significant savings and it was helpful, but not excessively so and there were a few chapters I skipped entirely.

It did have some good stuff near the end about what to do now that you're in the position you are where you have savings you're not sure what to do with and you're out of debt, but not super detailed like I'd imagine you want. You probably want a more advanced book, but it's only like $11 on Amazon so it wouldn't hurt to look if you're still curious. The main advice after you've got your money balanced so you're putting 20% into savings, 50% into things you need (housing, food, car, etc) and leaving 30% left over for whatever you want, is to invest in index funds with your excess savings after you have a safety net of 6 months worth of "Needs" money saved up.

Annakie fucked around with this message at 21:35 on Jul 13, 2012

Cicero
Dec 17, 2003

Jumpjet, melta, jumpjet. Repeat for ten minutes or until victory is assured.
My wife and I recently hit 10k of savings after a little more than a year out of college, in spite of having our first kid this last October and her not working. This is still mostly due to her, because I like shiny gadgets and games far too much. Thanks honey!

Sephiroth_IRA
Mar 31, 2010

Cicero posted:

My wife and I recently hit 10k of savings after a little more than a year out of college, in spite of having our first kid this last October and her not working. This is still mostly due to her, because I like shiny gadgets and games far too much. Thanks honey!

Yeah, my wife is the same way and I really appreciate it too. Sometimes she'll give her blessing and let me get what I want but usually she just convinces me I really don't need it or to sell some of my old stuff to pay for it.

Rolfus
Jan 14, 2008
Thanks to this forum I have been able to turn my financial life around! Two years ago the situation was this: New city, new job, new relationship - and very little understanding of my own economy. This meant that I was spending more than I made pretty much every month.

Then something changed. I don't remember why I started reading BFC, it might have been someone linking the first cornholio thread in GBS - but I've since read pretty much every thread on here and was able to take control of my own economy by: budgeting (thanks pearbudget!), negotiating for two major raises at work, and just generally starting to become more aware of my economy and living within my means. As an example; when I was a student in college I could spend 1000$ on food in a month, now we spend less than that for two people and I'm eating much healthier.

ch3cooh
Jun 26, 2006

Heard back from the owner of the company who I'm looking to buy 15 wells from. He says he's open to an offer. So now I need quadruple check all of my production forecasts and cash flow models then put the finishing touches on my business plan and start shopping for funding.

Life as an oil baron here I come!

Hired_Sellout
Aug 16, 2010

ch3cooh posted:

Heard back from the owner of the company who I'm looking to buy 15 wells from. He says he's open to an offer. So now I need quadruple check all of my production forecasts and cash flow models then put the finishing touches on my business plan and start shopping for funding.

Life as an oil baron here I come!

I don't know if this is the place, but I am curious to hear that story...

ch3cooh
Jun 26, 2006

Hired_Sellout posted:

I don't know if this is the place, but I am curious to hear that story...

I've got a degree in petroleum engineering and have been working in the exploration and production business since I got out of school 6 years ago. About 6 months back over some beers my best friend from college and I kicked around the idea of buying some low producing wells (less than 5 barrels a day) with upside to increase production with some engineering work. We spent the next 5 months evaluating prospects and trying to find the right opportunity. About a month ago we found 15 wells in Wyoming that produce about 350 barrels per month total. The operator has never worked on the wells and some of them have never even been placed on pump. We've sent the last month evaluating the production and the increase we could see based on results from offset operators. On Friday I reached out to the owner of the wells but he had already left for the weekend (must be nice!). He called me back this morning and basically said to make him an offer.

Scionic
Sep 24, 2007

Fun Shoe
I deposited my first $500 towards my new emergency fund. Not much, but have to start somewhere.


I've spent the last 9 months searching for a full time job living off my savings, so yeah build the fund it comes in handy.

xpander
Sep 2, 2004
I just purchased my first vehicle, an 02 Forester, with cash. Granted, that was entirely because we just got our profit-sharing money from work, but still, I worked hard for that. Prior to this, I drove my dad's castoffs, or nothing at all, so even though I've been driving for over a decade, it feels like a big step.

I also was able to engineer my work schedule to go down to a .8(4 days a week), so that I can spend that extra day doing cool stuff in life - mostly pursuing my budding live techno project, but also to start doing some iOS development, and just get out more. It's going to affect my budgeting, but I'm hoping to more than make up for it with side ventures.

I've been paying down my debt to my mom for almost a year now, which I didn't want to let fester. Once that's done, I am debt-free. Next will be shoring up the emergency fund and putting more money away for a trip to China in 2013.

Nocheez
Sep 5, 2000

Can you spare a little cheddar?
Nap Ghost
Within the past 6 months, my wife and I both purchased new(er) cars with cash. We budgeted for them and did not have to touch our emergency fund. I replaced an aging 99 Camry with a 2007 Camry, she got an 06 Matrix to replace her worn-out 01 Saturn.

We have been paying for her to finish her bachelor's at the same time. She got a promotion a couple months ago and will be finishing school in Spring. This will allow us to start saving lots of money for eventual purchase of a new home. We'd like to save $50k by 2016 for the down payment, again without having to touch our emergency fund.

Velochis
Apr 4, 2002

We go play hope
I recently got my first real job that I'm super excited for. Over the past four years the wife and I have saved up 60,000 for a down payment on a house. It's crazy thinking how we've been skimping by to save as much as possible, and we're about to drop an incredible amount of money.

Sephiroth_IRA
Mar 31, 2010
^Grats man. Hopefully we'll be there some day.

Just got the money my wife and I lent out to her aunt back. We're up to $30k in cash now :ohdear: Now we just have to continue saving and hope that we can get out of our mortgage in 6 months.

Camo Guitar
Jul 15, 2009
Eliminated one of my debts instantly with my tax return. While I still have a couple of larger debts, paying something out in one big hit is quite a nice feeling - especially since that money can be rolled into other things.

(And I'm resisting the temptation to think of the frivilous things I could have spent that tax money on...)

cheese eats mouse
Jul 6, 2007

A real Portlander now
I started my IRA with Franklin Templeton after meeting with my financial adviser on Friday. And then on Sunday I wreck my car and have my scooter broken during a theft attempt by the assholes around here.

But(!) I have $800 sitting in the bank for emergencies, and August is an extra paycheck month so I should be able to cover all those expenses. It's going to take me a few months to get enough cash saved to fix my car, so I'm just going to fix up the scooter and invest in theft insurance and a good lock, save gas and drive the scooter around while it's still warm. Won't start getting super cold until late September.

Plus my boss is fine with me working from home until I get transportation sorted. :)

Sudden Infant Def Syndrome
Oct 2, 2004

My wife and I worked ourselves out of debt, except for the remaining bit of her student loan, which we hope to finish paying off in August.

We have just over $15k in savings, and are about to purchase our house.

It's scary.

The house was left to my brother and I from my mother passing away, so I really only have to pay for half, but it's still about $140k.

mik
Oct 16, 2003
oh
In almost exactly two years I went from being straight up broke to...

- Started my own business which I co-own with my partner.
- Said business recently passed the $1m gross income mark.
- Moved into a great new apartment and got a dog with my girlfriend.
- Got a cheap car (i.e. no lease or anything, grocerymobile)
- Maxing out RRSP/TFSA, no debt, ~$200k in the bank which will go a long way towards a house in 5 years or so.
- Still living in Quebec with the highest taxes in the country :argh:

- My girlfriend has enjoyed a couple years of rewarding, but lower-paying, work for the last couple of years so her savings bumps us up a bit.

I've probably worked on average 60-80hr/week for the last two years trying to get this business going, and with some luck and a lot of hard work it's finally paying off.

This coming year will be dedicated to having a budget and sticking to it. I still feel like I waste a lot of money on frivolous things (beer, pot, food).

edited for clarity and speeling

mik fucked around with this message at 23:59 on Jul 26, 2012

Sudden Infant Def Syndrome
Oct 2, 2004

Congrats!

What does your business do?

Grok
Jul 23, 2006

ZOMBIE uses BITE!
It's super effective!
Lipstick Apathy
Oh my gods guys.



It's all thanks to BFC, cheap rice, and the death of my grandfather.

Now to get a bit more in savings and knock out those student loans!

DaveP
Apr 25, 2011
I just finished my first week of a new job fresh outta uni and had the global brand director of one of the world's biggest international branding agencies say my work was awesome!

purpleandgold
Apr 13, 2012
One credit card is paid off in full! The other will be as soon as I get my next paycheck.
And I finally have extra money to pay off my car and student loans. Getting out of debt actually sounds feasible.

GoGoGadgetChris
Mar 18, 2010

i powder a
granite monument
in a soundless flash

showering the grass
with molten drops of
its gold inlay

sending smoking
chips of stone
skipping into the fog


Down, down, down you go, credit card debt! Started tracking and categorizing my expenses and realized I was living a $3,000 lifestyle on a $2,000 income.

CuddleChunks
Sep 18, 2004

I've been listening to Dave Ramsey for a year or so on the way to and from work. It's great to hear all the folks who have gotten out of debt and his straightforward plan on how to do that. I haven't bothered to pay for any course materials and I really didn't come up with a written budget or follow an envelope system but other than having nothing to do with his plan I still took some inspiration from it.

That's why I'm happy to say that as of last Friday I am debt free for the first time in my life since starting college.

\:unsmith:/

I made the classic mistakes of getting a credit card as a freshman because it would build credit. Ahahahaha no, it just taught me about overspending and living like an idiot. Then I learned about signing up for *another* card and how you can transfer balances and still be messed up. I learned about extortionate interest rates and consolidation and lots of traps and stupid things. Along the way I ran up a student loan debt and after leaving school and getting an okay job I've been chipping away at it for years.

Thing is, I've never aggressively attacked it. That means it's sat like a lump and grown and grown due to compound interest while I've been twiddling my thumbs. That's just dumb as hell.

Thanks to some inspiring talk radio, good advice in BFC, some windfalls that I didn't immediately spend on bleep bloop computar machines I have finally kicked the poo poo out of the last remnants of my student debt. I paid off the credit card long ago and it just sits there being useless.

For the first time in my life all the money I make actually belongs to me. I can't wait to stuff it away towards a new car and travel plans and computer stuff. It's really exciting to know that I'll soon have a FICO score of 0 because I'll have no debt and no debt instruments in my name.

Engineer Lenk
Aug 28, 2003

Mnogo losho e!

CuddleChunks posted:

It's really exciting to know that I'll soon have a FICO score of 0 because I'll have no debt and no debt instruments in my name.

I'm pretty sure FICO doesn't work that way. It'll take 7 years for everything to drop off, and very few people are better off with a 'no credit history' rating. If you think you ever might want to get a mortgage, take out a loan to go back to school, pass a background check, get lower insurance rates, or waive utility deposits, you might want to develop a slightly more nuanced view of credit.

The demonization of all debt is a bad lesson to take away from Dave Ramsey. Debt is a tool. It has the potential for misuse, but it can be a very useful tool to have access to.

Eggplant Wizard
Jul 8, 2005


i loev catte

CuddleChunks posted:

It's really exciting to know that I'll soon have a FICO score of 0 because I'll have no debt and no debt instruments in my name.

You'd have a hell of a time getting loans and apartments later you silly man. What Engineer Lenk said is true- keeping an active, GOOD credit history is an important part of preparing for future expenses that might require a loan. Like, use your credit card once a month and pay it off immediately, or something. You could tie it to your netflix account or another auto-draw bill and just pay that amount every month. That way you'd have an active credit line and a very low usage ratio, which will make it so your FICO eventually says "HEY I'M RESPONSIBLE WITH CREDIT" instead of just "well he has an SSN so he's probably not an alien, illegal or interstellar." Even in the meantime, it'll say "Hey I paid off all my debts because I'm awesome, and now I'm living within my means and using credit responsibly, and also I have $(credit card limit) available to me already in case of emergencies." That's what you want. It's actually important to your FICO score to have active lines of credit because it shows that you can handle them and that you've been deemed trustworthy before.

e: FICO isn't only for loans anymore, either. Apartment rentals very often require a credit check, and employers are increasingly pulling them too.

Eggplant Wizard fucked around with this message at 15:29 on Aug 21, 2012

sanchez
Feb 26, 2003

CuddleChunks posted:





For the first time in my life all the money I make actually belongs to me. I can't wait to stuff it away towards a new car and travel plans and computer stuff. It's really exciting to know that I'll soon have a FICO score of 0 because I'll have no debt and no debt instruments in my name.

People have already mentioned this mostly, but if you ever want to buy a house, doing that will cost you thousands of dollars as you'll need to either pay points or accept a higher interest rate than someone with excellent credit.

CuddleChunks
Sep 18, 2004

Alright, I'll keep reading up on credit and whatnot. At the very least, my debt to income ratio took a very positive flip-flop here. Hooray for that.

Chajara
Jan 18, 2005

Well first off I signed up with mint.com, and it's amazingly helpful. I was using an app on my phone for budgeting, and that required that both I and my husband remembered to enter everything in manually. With mint.com being tied to both our accounts it's going to be a hell of a lot more accurate, plus it's got the student loans and what little credit card debt we have right there in one place.

Bigger news is that my husband landed a paid graphic design internship yesterday! It's $10 an hour while he's training and $12 after that, and lasts until February when their normal designer comes back from maternity leave. It'll be extra cash for us and a big boost to his resume.

I'm hoping to really start building more savings now. We've got like 8 grand but I'd like to knock out the credit card and some student loans and not have nothing left, so yeah. Time to get any unnecessary spending under control. I'm also trying to talk my husband into moving our savings to an online bank with higher interest and maybe to think about CDs or something.

Eggplant Wizard
Jul 8, 2005


i loev catte

Chajara posted:

Well first off I signed up with mint.com, and it's amazingly helpful. I was using an app on my phone for budgeting, and that required that both I and my husband remembered to enter everything in manually. With mint.com being tied to both our accounts it's going to be a hell of a lot more accurate, plus it's got the student loans and what little credit card debt we have right there in one place.

Bigger news is that my husband landed a paid graphic design internship yesterday! It's $10 an hour while he's training and $12 after that, and lasts until February when their normal designer comes back from maternity leave. It'll be extra cash for us and a big boost to his resume.

I'm hoping to really start building more savings now. We've got like 8 grand but I'd like to knock out the credit card and some student loans and not have nothing left, so yeah. Time to get any unnecessary spending under control. I'm also trying to talk my husband into moving our savings to an online bank with higher interest and maybe to think about CDs or something.

Great! Congratulations to your husband, and good on you for working to improve your situation. I bolded the last sentence just because honestly it's probably not worth it unless you mean long term savings, not emergency fund. I was playing on bankrate this morning and you'll be hard pressed to find anything over 1% (maybe there was 1.25% somewhere) for a year CD. I saw a 1.5% rate for a 5 year one :sigh: My high interest online account with ING is yielding me an incredible .79% or something like that. It's about $5 a month on my current balance, which is a little less than $8000 so I guess pretty close to yours. If it's going to take much trying and talking into, don't waste the energy.

Liquidity concerns aside, I'm reluctant to get into something like a 5 year CD at 1.5% because hopefully after 2014 the fed will have stopped holding down interest rates, right? I know low rates good for borrowers but banks aren't lending so NOBODY WINS.

Merou
Jul 23, 2005
mean green? :(

In June I left Texas and moved to Denver, Colorado for a new job where I make a pretty fair amount more than previous. My last W2, which would have included all my overtime and my most recent raise was about 47.5k for the year. My current job, at my current pay, with no overtime, is about 59.5k per year.

The only downside to this job is that since its social security exempt, I won't get social security when I retire (assuming its still around). So (assuming its still around) I may have to change jobs 5-10 years before I retire if they work that poo poo out and I feel I even need it. As it is, it goes into a private account, which my employer matches and adds 3%, so its my 6.2%, their 6.2%, plus 3%. Plus whatever the account earns.

Currently I'm planning to use the extra cash to pay my car off early, maybe start an IRA, and maybe start saving to buy a condo or something. Also finished my emergency account, its got 10k in it. I reckon that ain't bad for a 27 year old.

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Chajara
Jan 18, 2005

Eggplant Wizard posted:

Great! Congratulations to your husband, and good on you for working to improve your situation. I bolded the last sentence just because honestly it's probably not worth it unless you mean long term savings, not emergency fund. I was playing on bankrate this morning and you'll be hard pressed to find anything over 1% (maybe there was 1.25% somewhere) for a year CD. I saw a 1.5% rate for a 5 year one :sigh: My high interest online account with ING is yielding me an incredible .79% or something like that. It's about $5 a month on my current balance, which is a little less than $8000 so I guess pretty close to yours. If it's going to take much trying and talking into, don't waste the energy.

Liquidity concerns aside, I'm reluctant to get into something like a 5 year CD at 1.5% because hopefully after 2014 the fed will have stopped holding down interest rates, right? I know low rates good for borrowers but banks aren't lending so NOBODY WINS.

Thanks! Yeah after looking at rates and running numbers I came to the same conclusion. It kind of sucks :/

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